Listen to this articleThe Bryte platform comprises hardware, software, AI and content, offered both as a turn-key sleep technology platform for use under licensing to global mattress manufacturers, and within their own flagship product – The Restorative Bed™. Below is our recent interview with Ely Tsern, Co-Founder & CEO of Bryte:
Q: Bryte was founded in 2016, could you tell us your story?
A: Co-Founder John “JT” Tompane started the company in Los Altos inspired by his own experience and by that of a friend. JT himself had long suffered with overheating and sweating during the night that caused him to wake frequently, and rarely enjoy a full night of restorative sleep. But in 2016, JT was moved to action by the experience of a dear friend, who after falling from a horse became afflicted with body pains during the night and could not find a mattress that she could sleep comfortably on.
JT quickly assembled a top-notch team of sleep scientists and technologists, including Co-Founder & CTO Jonny Farringdon, an expert in biometrics and AI and Co-Founder and CEO Ely Tsern PhD, former technologist at Rambus with more than 180 patents to his name.
Together the team scoured latest developments in sleep science and quickly realised a mismatch between what we now know about sleep – most of which has been discovered in the last dozen or so years – compared to the state of mattress technology, which has not meaningfully progressed in 200 years.
This highlighted several major opportunities; First, to completely reinvent the bed from scratch, based on everything that we DO know now, with the express intention of being able to actively improve a person’s quality of sleep, unlocking the natural restorative powers that sleep offers. Then to think bigger than “just” the bed itself, and really consider the bed as the centerpiece of a connected platform with AI at the core, which could finally offer active sleep improvement in a way never previously possible.
Q: Can you give us more insights into your technology?
A: The Restorative Bed takes the familiar form of a luxury mattress with the very best soft furnishings and build quality. But inside is a matrix of 100 computer-controlled pneumatic cushions, which enable the bed to intelligently sense pressure points and redistribute support almost by the inch and to an extent not possible with springs or foam alone.
Also inside is an advanced heating and cooling system that actively regulates your temperature while you sleep. Not only does this stop you waking from overheating, but it is also proven to help optimize the amount of quality deep sleep and REM sleep, which many adults don’t receive enough of, even if their overall quantity is OK.
These are amazing features in their own right, but the magic of Bryte lies in the use of AI to tune how they are applied and experienced. Every sleeper is very different, and what may encourage restorative sleep for one person may disrupt it for another. So we use AI to learn the unique needs of each unique sleeper, then proactively apply micro-adjustments while they sleep, to continually optimize for greater restorative sleep.
Recommended: Q: How have you attracted customers to use your robotics-powered bed?
A: We use many of the channels you would expect, of course, but one area we are particularly unique is how we are able to reach customers through luxury hotels and wellness resorts.
While it is true that sleep is the foundation of health and wellness, it is also the very foundation of hospitality. At the end of the day, people visit hotels to sleep! Despite this, there has never previously been any hospitality-grade method for a hotel to actively help guests sleep better. Bryte is the only hospitality grade “smart bed” because it is the only product that is reliable & durable enough, silent enough, with no external control units or maintenance requirements, while still being luxurious enough to meet the exacting standards of luxury hotels.
Ultimately, our belief is that now this technology and these outcomes are possible, as many people as possible should have access to it. We don’t want to constrain the distribution of this technology by going it alone, so that’s why we are partnering with other mattress manufacturers to license our technology and accelerate adoption at scale.
Q: You’ve recently raised $24.4 Million in Series A funding; can you tell us something more?
A: Sure. This has been in conjunction with the announcement that our platform is available for licensing by top mattress manufacturers worldwide. And the roster of investors speaks volumes about the nature of the opportunity here.
Amy Huang of ARCHina led the round and we are delighted to announce that she has joined our board. Amy was an earlier investor in Luminar, who recently went public at more than $10Bn and is valuable for being the platform technology that powers the autonomous driving industry across manufacturers. Amy was also an early investor in Carbon, the platform for the 3D printing industry.
Amy says “”We believe that the Bryte platform will accelerate the restorative sleep tech revolution for the entire $432bn sleep industry, much as Luminar is accelerating autonomous driving adoption across automakers and Carbon is accelerating mass customization in the manufacturing industry,” says Huang. “Bryte is poised to become the Android of sleep.”
Other investors include John Warnock, Founder of Adobe and Dave Mooring of Rambus, both of which have built enormously successful businesses via licensing an entire industry.
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Q: What are your plans for the first half of 2021?
A: We look forward to announcing some major news in all categories of our business – consumer product developments, more luxury hotels joining our portfolio and of course major developments in the B2B licensing front.
Last Updated on February 27, 2021
